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Ralph Windle’s Blog on Science & The Arts

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ARTS/SCIENCE ‘ENCOUNTERS’: a Review

V      OH! THE WONDER OF IT.

‘Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast´.
Through the Looking-Glass: Lewis Carroll

Only some sense of the wonder of science can open the antechamber to its realities and awesome potentials. The paradox is that this assertion is as true of the practising scientist as of the `artist´ and every other discerning member of society, lay or professional.

And this, in a nutshell, is the credo which, I think, underpins the whole of the serious arts/science dialogue and delivers its relevance and significance (and why our children, too, need to be included in its logic - though that’s another, hugely important, story!).

The Sheffield Encounters owed  their special significance, in my view, to their (implicit rather than explicit) strategic assumption that both the `Wonder´ and the `Realities´ should be addressed; and in ways which involved, and produced value for - not just one but all three - of these relevant social constituents – `scientist´, `artist´ and `public´. This was done in an open, experimental, non-didactic way which turned occasional lapses into learning gains; and left all three constituents ready for more. Not only `knowledge´ but the seeds of new relationships passed between them; and the most remarkably consistent comment from all three - `scientists´ included - was the extent to which they too had enjoyed and been changed by the experience.

The first Encounter set the tone for all of this, and was critical to what followed. `How to be Creative´ was a workshop, fully interactive and great fun. A psychologist, Dr Kamal Birdi; a physicist, Dr Tim Richardson; and a Theatre Artistic Director, Alexander Kelly courageously exposed to their audience how the accessibly mundane can trigger exciting innovation. Soon, the audience were stripping off their shoes, examining the heels, and asking why they couldn’t be made of water ( Dr Birdi); invited to look again at the scum-in-the-bath which had given him new insights into the making of plastics (Tim Richardson);and how the close scrutiny of empty benches, through images and words, could trigger high creativity on the theatre stage (Alex Kelly). Or how the great story-teller, Philip Pullman, creates his imaginative mood and `fishes´ for the story (Rachel Falconer).

Workshops followed with much bending of pipe-cleaners, sketching of living spaces, practical projects for charity fund-raising…. And so on.
`The value of this event for me´, said organiser Rachel Falconer, `was that it broke down boundaries between the university and the general public. People chatted, got to know each other and had fun. It was a jolly affair, quite crowded and chaotic…. and it was more successful in making a general audience feel creative …than formal presentations from professors ensconced in their research.

This prepared the ground beautifully for Encounter 2 which, in a more controlled and spectacular way, gave cause for wonder at what has already been made to happen when `Art, Fashion and Chemistry Collide´.

Both Tony Ryan (Professor of Chemistry and Pro-Vice Chancellor of the Faculty of Science) and Helen Storey (Research Professor at the London School of Fashion) combine great expertise in their respective science and fashion design fields with strong ideas about the elimination of waste and environmental protection. This has led to ground-breaking research into environmentally progressive fabrics, combining the arts of chemistry and fashion design. The Wonderland Exhibition, cleverly located in Meadowhall’s retail paradise, demonstrated the wonder of science (a textile material that would dissolve in water, thus eliminating waste) in the context of deeply- held but practical concerns about the environment. In their talk for the Encounters, Tony and Helen introduced a film documentary of the project and the exhibition in Meadowhall and in Ireland (which attracted more than 11 million visitors). This was an example of interdisciplinary research with maximum vision, and maximal public impact, and it proved to be an inspiring and highly motivating event for the audience.

The 24 March (third) `Encounter´, Music, Birdsong and Brain Science, began to build out from this infrastructure of surprise and growing wonder at what might next come of the arts/science chemistry.
Its first significance was its demonstration of what marvellous things can happen when three people, at the very top of their disciplines but from dispersed fields across the (arts/science) spectrum, come together before a lay audience. Tim Birkhead (Professor of Animal and Plant Sciences) took us via their habitats to the behaviour of birds and why and how they sing ; Peter Hill (Professor of Music, concert pianist and a pupil of Olivier Messaien) explained how birdsong influenced our human musicology and, at the piano, illustrated what Messaien made of it; then Lawrence Parsons (Professor of Psychology) knit these three disciplines together, with the gripping story of experiments on the bird-specialist’s brain.

It was a memorable experience, again with a totally rapt and involved audience; but also introduced the neuroscience theme to the series - a theme which dominates the `Mainstream Issues´ part of the Encounters agenda (on my classification) and is proving a prime catalyst of the wider arts/science debate. As Rachel Falconer commented at the time “mind and brain studies are moving inexorably closer and this is one of the places where one can palpably feel the distance between art and science narrowing”. How right she is; but there are , as she warns, some dangers and controversies too.

Which brings us to Making Space in Music and Architecture which brought together the unlikely duo of Architect (Professor Bryan Lawson) and Composer (Dr Dorothy Ker) mediated by an outstanding clarinettist guest, Andrew Sparling. Andrew’s superb performance of Dorothy’s abstract piece for clarinet, well fitted to the spatial characteristics of the resonant staircase of the newly renovated Music building (formerly Jessop Hospital), prefaced her informal comments on the process of composition. Architect Bryan Lawson also used the language of rhythms and moods to describe his approach to the architecture of public spaces, such as hospitals, based on the view that buildings can make us well (or unwell) and that space is an active element in our being.

The implications of space in both music and architecture created another involved discussion with an audience clearly wondering at what they had heard and seen, and wanting more.
The climax to this accumulating sense of the wonders of science came on 19th May when guest speaker Richard Holmes, author of `The Age of Wonder´ (2008), led a marvellous discussion on the interwoven lives of poets and scientists in his multiple award-winning biography of the period.

And, in Rachel Falconer’s words, “Holmes proved, to me, the crucial point that in order to engage the layperson’s sense of the wonder of science, all one needs is a good story, engagingly told. The wonder is latent in the material, but it is the story that awakens our interest and interweaves this knowledge into the fabric of our lives and imaginations.”